Stage 5 of the Tour de France Femmes heads to French territory for the first time on this Grand Tour. Connecting Bastogne to Amnéville with 152.km, the route may be described as a flat day set up for sprinters, but the roads are truly not flat. The rolling terrain is dotted with five small, classified climbs that add up to 2,000 metres of elevation gain. There is just one intermediate sprint in Mercy-Le-Haut.
Demi Vollering (SD Worx-Protime) starts on Thursday in the maillot jaune, for a second day. Several riders made huge moves into Liège and are now pushing Vollering in the top five, include stage 4 winner Puck Pieterse (Fenix-Deceuninck) and breakaway companion Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM). Pieterse, the new mountains classification leader, is 22 seconds back and Niewiadoma is 34 seconds back. Two other riders are also under a minute from yellow, Kristen Faulkner (EF-Oatly-Cannondale) in fourth and Juliette Labous (DSM-Firmenich PostNL) in fifth.
The peloton rolls out from Belgium where the women’s pro peloton has started Liège-Bastogne-Liège since 2017. This year in addition to the Tour de France Femmes start, Bastogne also celebrates the 80th anniversary of the Battle of the Bulge from World War II. There’s no time for the riders to check out local history, however, as they set to carve out their own achievements before the big mountains on the weekend.
Just 14 bumpy kilometres from Bastogne, the first categorised climb appears - the 1.4km Côte de Hott, with an average gradient of 7.9%. This should serve as a launchpad for attacks. A pair of category 4 climbs announce the entry into France after the opening 60km - Côte de Saint-Pancré (1.5km at 3.9%) and 10km later the summit of Côte de Fermont (1.5km at 4.6%).
There is still relentless ups and downs to the intermediate sprint in Mercy-Le-Haut, which signals 19km to Côte de Briey (1.1km and 4.4%) and another 27.5km to the finish. But before the uphill finish, the Côte de Montois-la-Montagne (1.7 kilometres at 6%) looms, and offers bonus points at the top as well. The last 15 kilometres offer some descending, with no let up for a challenging final kilometre that begins with a 6% ramp and then finishes at 4% at the line in Amnéville.
Stage 5 climbs
- Côte de Hott (1.4km at 7.9%), cat. 3, km 42.6
- Côte de Saint-Pancre (1.5km at 3.9%), cat. 4, km 69.6
- Côte de Fermont (1.5km at 4.6%), cat. 4, km 79
- Côte de Briey (1.1km at 4.4%), cat. 4, km 125
- Côte de Montois-la-Montagne (1.7km at 6%), cat. 4, km 137.3
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